Redd Foxx

Original, gravel-voiced "dirty old man" comedian who, in the 1950s, was known to a limited audience for his x-rated standup material and under-the-counter recordings. Foxx became a household name, how...
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Newly-engaged Glee star Naya Rivera was in for shock as a guest on Arsenio Hall's revamped U.S. chat show on Wednesday night (30Oct13) - the host aired footage of her first appearance on his programme 22 years ago. Then just four, Rivera appeared alongside family friend Redd Foxx.

Although CBS withdrew the 1951-'53 series Amos 'n' Andy from its syndicated offerings in 1964 following protests by the NAACP that it stereotyped blacks, ten uncut episodes of the series are scheduled to be presented at The Black Film Festival, which opens in New York Friday. Festival coordinator Gregory Javan Mills told Friday's New York Daily News: "People like Redd Foxx have talked about how they were important in the history of comedy." (Numerous black actors worked in front of the cameras and several black vaudevillians worked as writers on the series.) The episodes are set to be screened on Aug. 18.

Carroll O'Connor
Actor Carroll O'Connor,
best known for his role as Archie Bunker on the 1970s television series All
in the Family, died of a heart attack Thursday at Brotman Medical Center in
Culver City, Calif. The heart attack was brought on by complications from diabetes.
Mr. O'Connor had
a toe amputated last year because of circulatory problems and underwent coronary
bypass surgery in 1989. He was 76.
Mr. O'Connor was born in Bronx, N.Y., on Aug. 2, 1924. He attended the National University at Dublin, in Ireland, in 1952 and the University of Montana, where he majored in English and speech. When he returned to the United States, Mr. O'Connor began winning supporting roles in feature films and guest appearances on TV series, including By Love Possessed and Hawaii. His apprenticeship as an actor was long and he spent many years as a substitute teacher, living with his wife Nancy and awaiting his big break. That finally came at age 46, when Mr. O'Connor became Archie Bunker on the groundbreaking series All in the Family.
The series, which premiered in January 1971, followed the lives of a blue-collar conservative, his "dingbat" wife (Jean Stapleton), daughter (Sally Struthers) and freeloading son-in-law (Rob Reiner). Audiences took a while to warm up to the sitcom that dealt with rape, affirmative action, gender debates and integration, but they fell in love with Mr. O'Connor.
"The funny thing about Archie is that he wouldn't change his mind," he told The Los Angeles Times in May 1994. "You got a kick over watching a guy who is constantly in pain over things you take for granted."
Reiner told The Associated Press on Thursday that Mr. O'Connor "was stubborn, just like Archie. But stubborn for the right things, to push for quality in the shows and to make sure that certain ideas were exposed in a meaningful way. He was much more soft-spoken, a much gentler person."
Mr. O'Connor frequently battled with the show's writers about what Bunker would say and do. Hollywood writer-producer Norman Lear, who cast Mr. O'Connor as Archie Bunker, publicly supported the actor's creativity and credited O'Connor for the show's huge success. Mr. O'Connor went on to produce several TV projects for CBS.
After Struthers and Reiner left the show in 1979, Mr. O'Connor and Jean Stapleton put onto the sequel, Archie's Place. Stapleton departed the series a year later in an emotional episode in which Edith died in her sleep. The series was cancelled in 1983. Mr. O'Connor, who constantly fought with CBS executives during the run of Archie's Place, vowed never to work with the network again. He returned to New York to make his Broadway debut in Brothers.
He wrote and directed several episodes of The Redd Foxx Show and made sporadic appearances in TV movies. Mr. O'Connor then returned to primetime television in In The Heat of the Night which ran on NBC from 1988 through 1992 and on CBS from 1992 through 1994. His return to CBS worked out his time, and after the series' cancellation, continued to work on several television projects for the network.
"He was a brilliant actor who redefined the nature of acting on television," CBS spokesman Gil Schwartz said. "He was a man of great talent and conviction, and who was a credit to the industry."
Tragedy struck the actor in 1995 when his only son, Hugh O'Connor, committed suicide. The O'Connors adopted Hugh in Rome a year after his 1962 birth. Hugh O'Connor fought his drug addiction for many years. A distraught Mr. O'Connor appeared on television and blamed drugs and the man who sold the drugs to his son for his death. The dealer was convicted in 1996.
After months of being in the public eye, Mr. O'Connor joined the cast of the Fox series Party of Five in the recurring role of the orphan's grandfather. He also had a supporting in last year's romantic comedy, Return to Me, playing Minnie Driver's grandfather.
Details of the funeral arrangements are not yet known. Mr. O'Connor is survived by Nancy O'Connor, his wife of 50 years.

Guest performer on "The Lucy Show", "The Addams Family", "Mr. Ed", "Green Acres" and "The Name of the Game" in the late 1960s

Returned as Fred Sanford on "Sanford and Son"

Did a short time in jail at Rikers Island for heisting a bottle of milk

Starred as a grandfather in TV series "The Royal Family" (produced by his protegee Eddie Murphy)

Died a few hours after suffering a heart attack on "The Royal Family" set during a rehearsal

Recorded the first of his scatological "blue" records; "The Life of the Party" became his first underground hit

Owned five homes, a TV production company, a theatrical managament firm, a Los Angeles nightclub and a Hollywood beauty parlor during "Sanford and Sons" heyday

Hopped a freight train to New York with his band; changed his name to Redd Foxx (from his red hair and Foxx from his stylish ways and the spelling of slugger Jimmie Foxx's name)

Played the black vaudeville circuit, also known as the "chitlin circuit"

Worked as nightclub comedian

Grew up in Chicago

Ran away from home at age 13 and joined a street-corner washboard band

Teamed in comedy act with Slappy White

IRS raided his Las Vegas home, taking his car and other possessions after Foxx made an estimated $500,000 for his appearance in "Harlem Nights" (1989)

Began appearing on TV and in Las Vegas during the 1960s

Hosted "The Redd Foxx Comedy Hour"

Summary

Original, gravel-voiced "dirty old man" comedian who, in the 1950s, was known to a limited audience for his x-rated standup material and under-the-counter recordings. Foxx became a household name, however, with his starring role as Fred G. Sanford (the name derived from his own real name), an irascible, scheming junkman, in the popular TV series "Sanford and Son" (1972-77). He went on to appear in the films "Cotton Comes to Harlem" (1970), "Norman... Is That You?" (1976) and "Harlem Nights" (1989), but died of a heart attack in 1991 after collapsing during a rehearsal of his TV comeback series, "The Royal Family".

Name

Role

Comments

Debraca

Step-Daughter

Ka Cho

Wife

Married July 1991 until his death Oct. 11, 1991married July, 1991

Yun Chung

Wife

Betty Harris

Wife

Evelyn Killibrew

Wife

Fred Sanford

Father

abandoned family

Mary Sanford

Mother

Education

Name

Notes

"Long before Richard Pryor and others began skewering social taboos about sex, race and other delicate topics, Mr. Foxx was playing nightclubs and making 54 'party records'--spoken comedy with no music--a genre he claimed to have originated in 1956."--Nick Ravo ("New York Times" obituary, October 13, 1991)

"No one expected me to be on television because I had a reputation from the party records as X-rated, but that's the type of humor I like. That's the humor I heard in the ghettos. They didn't pull no punches, and they didn't want to hear about Little Boy Blue and Cinderella. So I gave them what they wanted. I busted loose."--Redd Foxx in a 1982 interview (quoted in the "New York Times" obituary, October 13, 1991)